Appraisers discuss far West Side

Real Estate Weekly, May 28, 2003 by Elaine Misonzhnik

The redevelopment of the Far West Side of Manhattan was the focus of discussion at the New York Chapter of the Appraisal Institute's May meeting.

Vishaan Chakrabarti, director of the Manhattan office of the New York Department of City Planning, and L. Jay Cross, president of the New York Jets, advocated the building of a sports facility to, transform the area into a vibrant, mixed-use community.

According to Chakrabarti, the area known as Hudson Yards (which stretches from 28th Street to 43rd Street and from Eighth Avenue to the Hudson River) has been stunted by outdated zoning and a lack of public transportation. In an effort to spur development; city officials would like to extend the #7 subway line to 11th Avenue, improve the flow of pedestrian traffic, and create more public space. The hope is that these changes will naturally result in residential and commercial development in the neighborhood.

"Our plan does not propose to use any state or federal money, but hopes to bond against future development," Chakrabarti was careful to point out "We would use a series of payments in lieu of taxes and similar measures (to pay for any projects)."

The Department of City Planning has broken its redevelopment plan into six distinct parts, including a superblock commercial corridor, a mixed-use neighborhood, and an industrial transition area. The centerpiece of the plan, however, is a multi-use sports facility that would also be used as an extension of the Jacob Javits Convention Center.

"The Javits Center rates as number 18 convention center in the nation, so it cannot hold 16 of the largest conventions in the country," Chakrabarti noted. "This is a major problem for the city. A multi-use facility, like the proposed Jets stadium, would handle all of the Center's spillover space."

The reasoning is that the stadium would attract new businesses to Hudson Yards, as well as connecting it to the rest of Midtown via subway and pedestrian traffic.

"The primary liability of this area is that there is no mass transit available and there is also a major issue with the traffic from the Lincoln Tunnel," Chakrabarti said. "But it also has great advantages -- its proximity to Midtown Manhattan, its location as the regional gateway to New York. So there is tremendous capacity for commercial development and we expect to need about 100 million SF of class 'A' office space in the next 20 years."

The department hopes to coordinate the building of the stadium with the preparations for the 2012 Olympics, with the creation of public parks and other projects taking place over a more extended period.

L. Jay Cross, for his part, spoke about the usefulness of building a sports facility in the city.

"One of the reasons stadiums are controversial is that people have a lot of pre-conceived notions about them," he said. "Typically, the feeling is that stadiums belong in the suburbs because they create traffic and are a bad investment But we only have to look at Fenway Park in Boston and Pac Bell Park in San Francisco to realize that this is not always the case."

According to Cross, preliminary research has shown that 70% of football fans are more likely to use mass transportation than an automobile, insuring that there would be no significant disruption to movement in the city. He also insisted that the majority of event attendees would be loyal fans, committed-to spending money.

"People insist that stadiums just move money about from restaurants and movie theaters to another venue," he said. "But our fans would spend money on football no matter what, and New York would get the ticket charges. In addition, our Expo Center and Plenary Hall would bring people in from outside the city. This stadium would bring $80 million in tax revenues and create about 6,700 permanent jobs."

The Department of City Planning is currently working on the design and financial presentations for the redevelopment of Hudson Yards, with adoption of the plan scheduled for the spring of 2005.